Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

"Lydia?!"

Nailed to the wood paneling by her own daggers was Lydia. Her clothes were ripped, and her body was covered in cuts and burns. She was alive but unconscious and her breathing was very shallow.

~ Those burns are from curse magic but those cuts... She was tortured. ~

"Tortured?"

Seth used <Observation> but could not see much more than her health bar and some of the status effects thanks to the level difference. Her HP was slowly decreasing and suffered from several negative status effects like bleeding and anemia.

After making her drink a health potion her Hp stopped dropping and some of the debuffs disappeared. He waited for her health to stabilize before removing the dagger from the wall paneling behind her.

He moved her aside and the secret door opened.

"I see, you have returned. It\'s a shame you had to see this little... interfamilial difference." he heard someone say from the stair. It was Valen slowly walking down. His fangs were completely extended and he was drying his hands and claws with a slightly bloody white towel.

"I was just washing up after having a talk with my niece," he said with a sardonic smile. An infernal aura was emitting from the old vampire as his eyes glowed with the desire for blood.

~ Get in the elevator, hurry! You can\'t fight him 1 on 1. ~

Seth lifted Lydia and equipped his full gear. Only two steps separated him from the elevator. He had just made his first step when a tremendous force hit his back and flung him and Lydia into the elevator.

"AaaargH!" a scream echoed through the lobby but not Seth\'s. Groaning Seth from the heavy strike and pushed the air out his lungs he managed to close the elevator gates.

As he looked up, he saw the vampire holding his hand with an expression distorted in pain. His claws were bleeding profusely with the nails broken and ripped out. As strong as the vampire was, his nails could not beat an epic-rated armor.

The armor durability had fallen slightly and he had taken some blunt damage, but thanks to the reflected damage and overwhelming defense, Valen had hurt himself more than he had hurt Seth.

The blacksmith almost felt confident to fight the vampire, if he didn\'t see the wound healing almost instantly. The bloodsucker had an even more freaky regeneration speed than a troll. After the claws had healed Valen threw himself at the slowly descending elevator but there was nothing he could do to get in or stop it.

Only the tower master could enter and bring people with him. Frustrated the monster roared and screamed as it hit and scratched on the barrier. At this point, the beast had lost all semblance with the elegant Valen and looked much more like a mutated monster bat or a really ugly gargoyle.

And he had seen gargoyles. This was ugly even for their standards. Lydia and he slowly descended and Seth was happy when the thing left their view and was replaced by dark rock walls.

"Fuck... didn\'t expect that one..."

He had hoped to leave the Willis Family in the dark for a little longer. Who would have thought they would find out so soon and react with such savagery. He had some time to think about what just happened and could roughly guess what had happened.

But that they would actually fight and torture one of their family members! It simply confirmed that their decision to cut them off was right. He sat on the floor of the elevator and held Lydia in his arm; slowly feeding her another health potion.

With the rising health bar, the cuts and bruises that covered her body slowly closed and improved. He just finished when the elevator finally stopped at his private quarters.

"Tower? Can you hear me?"

"Affirmative, Master."

"Close off the Elevator shaft. Nothing his allowed to pass through there unless I say otherwise. Anything that might manage to enter the shaft is to be teleported to a random place outside the tower."

Seth supported the wounded cybergoth and walked out of the elevator.

"Port to the medical facilities."

"Affirmative."

"Boss! What happened!?" he was greeted by Jonah\'s surprised voice when he suddenly appeared in the med bay. The voices of Monique, Evee, and Drosi followed. Especially the old cat was surprised to see a Seth in full gear suddenly appear with a half-dead girl on his shoulder.

They put Lydia down on one of the beds and left the medical treatment to Evee and Drosi who had offered his help. As an experienced healer, he was a great help to the young witch. In the meantime, he assembled the others in the control room and explained the situation to them.

The Willis people had obviously held some suspicions and ended up falling out with Lydia. Since it was highly likely that they tortured her for information, they probably knew about their plan to keep them out of the loop.

"Then how are we supposed to get to the surface?" Monique asked annoyed.

"Oh, don\'t worry about that one. Tower, scan this token and incorporate the sequence into the teleport function. Then you should be able to connect to Delta\'s access port."

"Affirmative."

"Now we can teleport into the city whenever we want to," he explained to them how the access roughly worked.

~ You should also make something like this token that gives off a signature. That way the tower will know when to transfer people from the port into the tower. You have the sigil of the tower master, but the other here don\'t. ~

Another point on his to-do list. Seth sighed.

"Since the Willis Family fell out with us, did you get a connection for the energy trade?" Alison asked finally. Seth looked at her in surprise. She was right, how did they even get suspicious in the first place?

After telling them everything that happened, they came to the conclusion that the family probably had the official of Delta in their pocket. The possibility that they had something to bribe an official of the Empire was small. The princess must have informed them about their business and that guy, in turn, told the Willis Family.

"I will give contacting the Empires main priority then. Let\'s talk about something more delightful. How about all of us go to the city in the evening and meet the rest of the gang. We can also decide on the name of our organization."

"Sound great!" Link called out. He had been a little jealous of Seth being able to go out and party without them. Everyone else also nodded and smiled. It would have been a lie to say that the others did not feel similar. Everyone wanted some time to shut off and relax.

They could not come and go as they wished until Seth managed to make a token to enter the tower, so they appreciated the chance to go and have some fun. But first, he returned to the med bay to find Drosi.

The old cat was tending to the still unconscious Lydia.

"How is she?"

"Out of danger, for now. But these burns might accompany her for the rest of her live." the elder said and looked down at her with empathy. Seth finally got a look at Lydia with terrible cuts and covered in blood.

He could not see the full scale of the burns but the wounds covered half her neck and crawled up her jawline and her cheeks. Al had already mentioned something like that but Drosi explained to him in detail.

Under the system\'s influence, there were few wounds that could result in permanent damage. A cut off arm? A high-ranked or high-leveled healer could regrow it. Terrible burns? They would slowly heal automatically as long a one survived.

Cursed fire was one of the few ways to cause permanent damage. The malignant power of the curse would embed itself into the flesh and hamper the healing process. Even if it healed, without a thorough purification it would leave ugly scars.

It was already cruel to use something like this at all. But using it on their own family member? It hit Drosi, who came from a culture of close familial bonds a lot harder than Seth and the others.

They both sat down and talked at her bedside. About what happened. And about their plans from now on. Seth also came clean about hoping for the Tijaahk to join him.

"I will have to talk with my people about this.. I will contact you when we came to a decision."